Dispossession

The opening of the British Museum’s The Bayeux Tapestry exhibition is not far off now. In early July, a bright yellow truck transported the tapestry from France via Eurostar, arriving in London under cover of darkness. With George Osborne, chair of the museum, posing as the symbol of a new entente cordiale, the display is being hailed both as a diplomatic triumph and as the blockbuster exhibition of a lifetime. Soon many thousands will have the opportunity to experience what Max Adams in his new book describes as this ‘dazzling, cinematic, embroidered strip cartoon’. Speculation that the tapestry (actually an embroidery on linen) is missing a final scene is probably correct.

At the end of the last century, Simon Winchester bought 123 acres of wooded mountainside in the hamlet of Wassaic, the village of Armenia, the town of Dover, the country of Dutchess, the state of New York, the country of America. His land had originally been inhabited by the Mohicans, who grew corn and squash and beans until they were expelled by the Dutch. It was then owned, in the titular sense, by Charles II, James II, Mary II, William III and Georges I, II and III, and had passed through the hands of a series of farmers, charcoal-makers and Sicilian immigrants before Winchester became its custodian.